be off. i was onthemccaincampaignso i've seen him in primary debateswithmccain, inprimary debates in 2008 and now in 2012. ki tell you, there's times he's on, like when he was in florida in the last two primary debates. there's times he's been totally off, like the last two debates in south carolina where newt gingrich had him on the ropes. >> but he has to do something to turn around the dime nick this race. >> what's interesting is, yes, you have sort of the official romney/ryan line that mitt romney can't form a complete sentence and bark obama is cicero and it's going to be very hard. but what christie said is what you're hearing from people behind the scenes. there was a piece with a lot of anonymous quotes from romney aides saying, we need a game changer. i think the good news for romney is if you look back to those primary debates that you were talking about, he did the best in the debates where it seemed like he absolutely had to win. so the south carolina debate, seemed like he was on cruise control, sort of playing a prevent defense against newt gingrich. but then once g

dan lothian john kerry is playing mitt romney. take a listen tojohnmccain. hespoke with candy crowley yesterday on "state of the union." john mccain the last man to debate president obama. >> i think both are excellent in their own way. i think you could argue that mitt has had a lot more recent experience. obviously. but also, candy, part of it depends on who's moderating. >> the man's been on the national stage for many years. he's an experienced debate per. this is mitt's first time on this kind of stage. >> paul ryan on the sunday talk shows. the running mate talking down expeations. look at this count. brand-new from abc news/"washington post" this morn ing. who's more likely to win the debates? the president by 20-some points. a lot of americans think the president will have the upper hand on wednesday night in denver. >> we'll see. many thanks. cnn's live coverage of wednesday night's debate starts at 7:00 eastern. >>> syria is expected to try to justify its actions in its bloody civil war when its foreign minister speaks before the united nations general assembly later

senatormccain. ijumped in there as soon as he declared because he has been a friend and he has always been in the center, someone that tried to work on immigration reform, tried to work on environmental issues, energy issues and all the things that i stand for, and he was there in 2003 when i ran in the recall, he was there in 2005 for the special election, he was there again in 2006 for the re-election and when we tried to pass legislation, environmental legislation to make commitments of reducing the greenhouse gases and all of this stuff. he was very supportive in every step of the way so i of course jumped in and helped him right from the beginning. >> if you had been president four years ago instead of barack obama, how would things have been different? you could have been if you were born here. who knows. if you had been, do you honestly think you could have done any better than barack obama has done inheriting such a huge financial mess? is the reality that whoever took over was going to be pretty much where he is now? what do you think? >> we maybe would have done things a lit